The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1887-05-13

The old song comes back to me with
the quaint rhythm as / write:
He sent his servant to the town,
Where Barbry was a-dwellin',
Sayin' you must go 70 me own master
Ef your name be Barb'ry Allen.
Then there was another stanza that
was very affecting indeed:
And as she walked adown the street
The bells they were a-tollin',
And every toll they seemed TO say,
Handkerchief Barb'ry Allen.
/ know the old song would not at
tune well to a parlor organ, and 1
doubt if you could play it on grand
piano. But there was pathos of the
thing that stirred my youthful soul to
its depths.
Blue-eyed spring began to grow
plump, and finally developed into the
maturer charms of summer. Summer,
with the drone of the bumble-bee at
noon, and lazy Lawrence dancing on
the worm fences. Summer time, sweet
summer timel The peaches ripened
and redeemed, and the corn silks began
to appear. Doc said if the first silk you
saw was red one you would be healthy
and lucky the balance of the year. The
first one he saw that summer was a red
one.
And, 0, the signs and sayings he
taught us. He told us that if we saw
the new moon in a clear sky it was
lucky. He told us if we killed a toad
our best COW would die. He told us
that the knots in Old Beauty's name
when we went to feed her in the morn
ing-Old Beauty was our hOrse-were
caused by the witches who rode her
the night before, and used these knots
for stiIrups. Then he said when old
Dominicker, my favOrite hen, took a
spell of growing that
"Whislin' women an CROWN hens
is apt to come to some bad end"
Sure enough, blue darter hawk
killed old Dominicker the very next
Sunday.
Doc began to be stout and strong
now. He looked on the faded jacket
and little breeches he wore when he
first came to our house in sort of
reminiscently plying way, for his arms
| had grown more muscular, and his
short legs had grown stouter, and Doc
began to be a right goOd-looking boy,
after all.
Autumn came with her sad eyes and
sobbing winds. Autumn had deeper
significance than ever before, for there
were portentOus tidings waited from
afar on every breeze that wandered
through the heavens. A big white
comet blazed in the sky, and Doc said
/ that meant war. Doe was a respecta-
| ble-lOoking lad, indeed, now. He was
/ fifteen years old, but few would have
believed it. His eyes still had that far
away expression in them. He was older
than his years.
That was winter long to be remem-
bered. Gray uniforms were seen at
the last yearly meeting, held in Novem-
Der, and the preachers at that meeting
| spoke words that sounded harshly in
our untutored ears. Young women
| hummed warlike airs, and were eager
to catch the last refrain.
l remember how the crimson deep
/ ened on Cousin Sues brown cheek
when she ratified off:
Huzzai Huzzal for the bonnie blue flag so dear,
/ Huzza for the sword and plume that Southern
soldiers wearl
At the first frolic the fiddler wore
a red feather in his hat and played
Dixie"
| Men talked and women sang, and
the warm blood ran riot in the South
ern veins. Son to war" go, Johnnie,
aire YOU boun' to be a soldier?"
Your waist il is too slender,
Your hands, they are too small,
| And your checks too red and rosy
/ To face a cannon ball
| And sing O-and sing o,
Sure you WILL my dear!
One wintry night the Northern sky
| burst into a deep crimson, and we
| knew that the supernatural flame of
aurora borealis was burning on the
| brow of heaven. Doc said that was
the sign of war. Every thing was the
sign of war. We had noticed the omi-
nous wv" on the back of the locusts in
the early autumn. Captain Jack Raj
ney had muster every week, and the
tramp, tramp, tramp of the gathering
squadrons shattered the slumberous
depths of the barrens.
knew that Doc had met Lucy Pax
ton at the frolic, and l knew that he
had followed her every movement with
a fascinated gaze. She was not grown
up, but she was ''most grown they
all said. She was thirteen, and the
young men chose her for a partner
when they played ''all around the
merry pole, and Doc sat and watched
her.
These were stirring times. Men and
women shattered the letters of cOnven-
tiOnality and grew from boys to men
and from girls to women with marvel
Gus rapidity.
At candy-pulling Doc pulled candy
with her. The way of it was that they
all played lonesome, and as they
needed one more to be the Lonesome
one, J." and he was induced, much
against his viii, to join. His success
emboldened him, and so the boy and
the girl pulled candy, and both were
so painfully conscious of their own
yOuthfulness that they pulled in silence
Lucy's brother John was nearly
eighteen. He was a dutiful boy and
his mother was a widow. He worked
for her and for Lucy and they lived
well.
Again spring gladdened the earth
with her spirituelle beauty. But there
was not as much boisterousness at the
annual ''log-rolling'' as usual In
fact, there were very few log-rollings
Mothers and daughters and younger
sons pulled the fallen trees together
the best they could and burned them
Women in big sunbonnets, kept from
Topping over their eyes by wooden
"splits" inserted in the crown, grasped
the pillow handles, while "tucking
strings" girded about their waists kept
the skirts from trailing in the dirt
All, they were made of superior mettle